The Adventure Begins

Hello All,

I've graduated! Woo-hoo! Now, I venture forth into the real world. With real being relative...... because the first thing I intend to do with this unstructured freedom is to travel around the world. I was trying to find someway in which to travel through Africa overland. I went to Ghana last summer and, as trite as it is, fell in love with the small chunk of Africa I saw and wanted to see more. In my online perusing I discovered a group The World by Road ( www.theworldbyroad.com) composed of Steve, Steve, and Duane who were attempting to drive around the world. What an amazing idea! I decided to see if I could join up with them. Success!

This blog is too keep those of you who miss me (note blog title) to keep tabs on my whereabouts and thoughts over these next couple of months without forcing you to keep hitting that delete button in your inbox. This does not mean, however, that I will not respond to emails....I look forward to them and find myself checking my inbox quite frequently. If you write, I will respond.

Phase 1: Acclimate to travel by inter United States travel

After leaving Macalester college following the truely Macalester-esque experience of a throat singing concert in the raquetball court, Andrew and I began driving to Colorado. The manageable 14 hour excursion turned into an inhospitable adventure at about the half-way point when I gracefully allowed Andrew to begin his driving segment. The rain turned to sleet, turned to snow, turned to white-out conditions. In the midst of conditions in which I was driving by looking out the side window ( attempting to keep myself about 5 feet from the poles lining the road) the windshield wiper landed with a thud on the hood of the car. We brought the brick of a windshield wiper in the car, dethawed it and reattached it. Shortly afterward we watched in dismay as the windshield wiper wings off into the snowy abyss. Andrew runs to the front of the car to attempt to take the passenger side windshield wiper and put it on the drivers side. I run back on the snowy highway to search for the wiper but hope of that is destroyed as a plow sweeps by. Luckily there are many lights to follow on this plow and the poor little front-wheel-drive toyota corrolla courageously fights through to Denver.

I think the roads were closed while I was on the way to Boulder where I was snowed in. Sound disappointing?....hardly....it's fun....difficult for it not to be with my good friend, Jimmy, and three feet of snow. With the accompaniment of Joe, Jimmy's friend, we hike about and eat at all these sweet places in Boulder. The joy induced by three feet of snow and resigning yourself to the fact that most businesses are closed and you just MUST enjoy the snow is quite contagious. Everyone was out skiing, snowshoeing, trudging, and sledding (Target ran out of sleds).

A day later and many plow hours later, the roads reopen and Jimmy and I make our way into Denver. When we pull up to Steve and Steve's house where they have just finished skiing from behind their truck all over the streets of Denver. An idea many have had but most have not been brave enough to pursue. Luckily we were able to live vicariously through their video footage later on that evening. We also went out to eat at the red room...a nice dining experience. It was actually pretty considerate of them to stay open as many dining venues had closed to the inclimate weather. On the way into the restaurant we jumped a couple of snowbanks only to realize that one was actually a vehicle. It was a good evening and it only makes me more excited to travel with them.

On the way back, I was driving on some pretty bad roads. Jimmy was asleep. The semi in front of me starts fish tailing, the semi next to me is about to start fish tailing...I have almost no control over the car.....JIMMY...(I yelled him to consciousness so that at least we would die together) but as you ARE reading this blog we made it.

Along the way back the muffler decided to take leave and almost did. We pulled over to the side of the road. A truck happened to be there and happened to contain luck in the form of Kevin and Linda. This couple had tools and reattached the muffler...drove us to a hardware store bought the pieces to really fix us and then insisted on taking us to lunch. I messed up by eating before we prayed. This just goes to show you that half of luck is the kindness of strangers.

The highlight of driving through Nebraska was the stop at Mr. Keith Graul's house. It happened to be his sister's graduation party and there was a three tier chocolate fountain and more food than 100 people could possibly eat. We met a lot of his friends and he gave us the royal tour.

Unfortunately, the visit was short. Pressing family holiday obligations (fine food, relatives, presents) dictated an early departure. Jimmy and I arrived safe and sound back in a Madison for a not-so-white Christmas.